what's happening at the Shady B Ranch

Ok, now this is one job that I would NOT want.  Every kid, if you ask them what they want to be when they grow up, says,"a veterinarian".  Hm-m-m, maybe if they saw this picture, they might think differently. 

So the news is this - our mare April, is NOT pregnant - bummer - we took her to the stud no less than four times, but it just wasn't meant to be this year.  Our other mare didn't get pregnant either, so no baby for the Shady B Ranch next year. We'll try again in the spring.   Maybe five huge hay eating mouths to feed is enough for now.  That doesn't include the cow and her calf!  They eat their share of hay too!

Me n Gracie

Sometimes - well - MOST of the time, the best thing about going away on vacation is coming home.

I drove up the driveway last night, just as the sun was setting, and a glorious silvery full moon was rising, to my very sweet husband and my teeny tiny lap dog Gracie, both waiting for me at the end of the driveway. Well actually, Gracie was bouncing all over the place, so excited she could hardly contain herself.  She just fills me with happiness - and I guess I do the same thing for her.   Isn't that grand?  

Before it got too dark, we quickly fixed a cool cocktail and spent a nice half hour in the garden, watching the moon rise - I missed this old place so much. 

It is SO good to be home.

My trip was very inspiring and exhausting and absolutely wonderful. 

I learned SO many new things last week in those beautiful Smoky Mountains of Tennessee................................More on that later. 

OK, so sorry - I have been delinquent in writing!  SO very wonderfully busy this whole year!  Grace is growing - STILL - I will post pictures of her later....we just got home from a wonderful trip to the Rocky Mountains with my brother and my sis in law - I always leave a part of my heart behind when I visit those incredibly majestic mountains - and am indescribably inspired when I return.  I am about to attend a clay conference in the Smoky mountains too!  So I'm getting a good dose of mountain air this beautiful fall.  The air here in Texas is beginning to get cooler, our air conditioning is off, and we are enjoying the outside again.  There just aren't enough hours in a day.

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Well, this year I got an unexpected surprise and my sister in law cancelled Christmas.  Well, not everyones Christmas, but the Christmas at her house, like we've always done - from the Christms cookies the kids decorate on Christmas Eve, to the fried turkeys that are  my husbands specialty and contribution to the Holiday meal, to the wrapping paper COVERING the floor in the living room. 

The rules were as follows.  Everyone could sleep as long as they liked.  No-one could wake anyone up.  You had to stay in your pajamas.  You had to have a cup of coffee or whatever was your morning drink of choice.  No-one could start opening until EVERYONE was present.  And the paper had to stay on the floor until sister had time to go through EVERY scrap and make sure that nothing got thrown away that shouldn't.  Then we started breakfast.  After breakfast, we started cooking the dinner, which was actually started the day before, along with all the other goodies that were already all over the house, tempting the taste buds with sweet and salty creations, tidbits that couldn't possibly have calories attached to them, because just a tiny bite was too small..........

Anyway, THAT got cancelled, and while I was worried about the real reason (no, I don't believe it was entirely because brother in law couldn't be there because he had to work) - I WAS overjoyed at the prospect of possibly having an entire Christmas in my home, complete with Santa Claus and the whole turkey dinner.  I started making phone calls.  First to dad-e-o, to make sure that it was ok with the big boss.  Once I got his blessing, and his willingness to drive all the way out here and bring all of the Christmas they had collected up over the past months with them, I started calling other brothers and sisters and delegating food and making lists of the things we would need.  After a day of rushing around getting it all together, the first of my family arrived on Christmas Eve, and we had an easy lunch of Cheese Soup that my mother had brought, and some beautiful bread to go along with it. 

It was an absolutely georgeous day.  The sun was shining, and I took my neice and nephew for a wild ride around the ranch on the golf cart.  We fed the horses some carrots, and found a bounty of pecans in the pasture.  We picked up a five gallon bucket full. 

While this was happening, sister was dressing the bird.  She has a special recipe that has replaced the stinky fried turkey. Sorry babe.   While a fried turkey is yummy to eat, it stinks a lot when it is cooking, and the smell gets into everything, even tho it is cooked outside.My husband  smells like fried turkey, the barn smells like fried turkey, the whole area smells like fried turkey, then the refrigerator smells like fried turkey.  For a week or more.   Now, sister cooks a turkey filled with oranges and cloves and onions, and we get to enjoy an AROMA instead of a SMELL.  There is a difference, you know.

In the afternoon, after it got dark, we opened one gift each.  And were overjoyed.

Around 7:00pm, we had a marvelous feast of turkey, giblet gravy, mashed (not whipped) potatoes (there IS a difference), sweet potato  cassarole, heavenly vegetables (I'll share this recipe if you like), cranberries (the jelly kind that is formed like the can, and sliced), pickles and olives and candied jalapenos, and then pumpkin  and pecan pie for dessert with dream whip, of course.

THEN, before we all got too comfy on the sofa and fell asleep after all that L-Tryptophan, we took turns reading the Christmas Story by candle light.  And everyone was tucked into bed by 10:00.  Wow, what a day. A day to remember.

Christmas morning dawned bright and full of promise, once again.  As the sun was just coming over the horizon, I made my way into the kitchen, made some tea, turned on the sparkly tree lights,  and peeked into the room where my neice was sleeping.  She was wide awake. In the bit of light from the hallway, I quietly whispered to her to go see if Santa had come.  And he had!  Brought her a stocking full of tiny wrapped packages!  As people started trickling into the room, with coffee cups, and warm pajamas, she was elected the perfect tiny elf to pass out packages from under the tree.  Once everyone was sitting in a comfortable spot, with loads of wrapped and beribboned packages all over them,  we started unwrapping our gifts, taking turns, so each person could see what the other had recieved and enjoy listening to the kids delight with their presents. 

Then breakfast.  A huge and beautiful Christmas Cinnamon Ring, that mom has made for Christmas morning as long as I can remember.  I have not had the pleasure of enjoying this sweet-roll in many years, so it was another of the gifts I recieved!  Complete with scrambled eggs from my happy chickens, made perfect by my nephew (who is quite a good cook), and we had another feast around my kitchen table. 

I got exactly what I wanted for Christmas.  The warmth of family and friends at my table.  Good food, prepared with great love and gastronomic passion.  Comfort, as everyone had a place to rest.  And so much Joy, from children and adults that believe.

Happy New Year Y'all!

I've been SO blessed this past year and want to give thanks to God, the Creator of all things, and to all those that helped make 2007 a success! If you are reading this now, you are most likely one of those to whom I want to give that thanks.  A special thanks to the people at etsy for creating a website that enables artists and crafts-people to sell their work from their home.  I wish my grandmother could have enjoyed such success with the lovely things she made.  Her legacy to me is that she taught me many of those things.  How to tat, and crochet, and sew a button.

 2008 promises to be an even greater year, full of promise!  I have made my list of the things I want to accomplish - a sort of resolution - but none of that "I want to lose weight or quit something or another" No, this year, I want to finish some of the projects I started, and build on new ideas, and dreams.  In the book of Proverbs, chapter 13, verse 9, it says......."A longing fulfilled is sweet to the soul."  I've longed for my home to be a placed inspired by creativity, warmth and peaceful respite, full of yummy smells in the kitchen and lots of comfortable spots to curl up with a book.  I long to spend time with my "self" and do just that in one or all of those spaces.  Once they are finished..........

One of my new dear friends and customers from etsy  writes for the paper in Kenmare, North Dakota.  You can  check out her news and her words at www.kenmarend.com

Here is a copy of her "fresh eyes" column. 

But how often do we step back to say we are blessed? And by doing so, can it balance and even mitigate the stress?

I’m going to find out this year. Too blessed to be stressed will be my focus in those times when life seems to close in on me. Maybe in the light of naming and counting my blessings, my "stressings" will dissolve--or at least become more diluted.

The thing about blessings is that one readily seems to lead to another--I’m finding that out as I go. And that’s what Rachel the tilemaker meant, too, when she told me this is "...one of those Pay It Forward phrases."

So how about your blessings for 2008? Just name a couple, right now, and you’ll start the New Year too blessed to be stressed.

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One day last week, I took a precious day off and spent it with my friend Christy.  We got out the paints and the canvas,and painted just for the fun of it.  The studio smelled like oil paint for the first time in a long time.

I still want to paint on this one a little more, but I have to live with him for a while and think about what I want to do.

This is Herman, our favorite rooster, that got et by something whilst defending his gals.  He was a good un.  That Hermie was.  Used to fly up on  my shoulder if I bent to pick something up.